Statistical analysis
Continuous variables were presented as means and standard deviations, or medians and interquartile ranges for variables with skewed distributions, and categorical variables as frequencies and percentages. Normal distribution was confirmed using Shapiro-Wilk test. Categorical variables were compared using Fisher’s exact test or the Chi-square test, as appropriate, while t-independent test and Mann-Whitney test were used to compare parametric and non-parametric independent samples, respectively. P -values <0.05 were considered statistically significant. Analyses were performed with the use of IBM SPSS software (version 25.0).